How to Plan a Cycling Trip to the Tour de France, Part 7: Tips and Tricks

 

This 7 part series is a shortened series of content from the Cycling Through France ebook

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In Part 1, we cover the creation of an itinerary (initial planning) involving Tour stages, climbs to do, as well as what airlines you might look at.

In Part 2, I discuss Accommodation and Car Hire choices.

In Part 3, we discuss booking flights, accommodation and car/campervan hire.

In Part 4, we look at on the ground stuff like Tolls, Fuel, Food and Camping.

In Part 5, we talk about following an actual Tour stage.

In Part 6, equipment is looked at. Bike bags (transportation), riding gear and general “stuff” is looked at. Equipment is covered in detail in the Cycling Through France ebook.

Welcome to Part 7 (the final part) in our series on planning a cycling trip to France. I wrote these posts as a high level summary for anyone who didn't want to, or couldn't afford to right now, get the Guide to Cycling through France ebook.

In Part 7, we’ll look at:

• Pitfalls, Tips, Tricks
• Insurance
• Visas
• Money/credit cards
• Mobile phone roaming/internet
• The language
• Document Protection

So, onto the details. Remember, I only cover these topics at a high level. If you want indepth detail – tips, tricks and things to watch out for – I highly recommend checking out the 70+ pages of the Guide to Cycling through France ebook.

Pitfalls, Tips, Tricks
There are many, many pitfalls to avoid in planning your dream trip – way too many to cover here. And despite my adventures to France, I still make mistakes!

There are also loads of insights and tricks to be used to maximise the enjoyment of your trip.

Read this post, which covers our 2010 trip, including what went wrong, and what went right. It will give you some good insights into potential pain points.

And of course the Guide to Cycling through France ebook contains loads more tips and tricks.

Insurance
Insurance is an easy topic. I highly recommend just using platinum credit card insurance. Whilst this might seem a bit salubrious, it's totally worth it.

I used to use standard travel insurance from the travel agent when heading overseas.

These days though, I always buy my airfares on my platinum credit card which provides much better insurance than what I can get through a travel insurance company. I've now flown overseas using credit card insurance 4 times, made 2 claims, and it's just awesome.

In 2009, I had to make 2 claims and these were paid without even so much as a phone call – the money was paid right into my bank account.

In case you’re wondering, I use Westpac Earth Platinum and Westpac Altitude Platinum. Yes I have one of each – Earth Platinum is linked to Qantas Frequent Flyer and earns at 1.5:1 and Altitude can be redeemed on numerous airlines and earns at 3:1.

Given I travel overseas once or twice a year, the $250 Platinum card fee is well worth it since I usually spend $150 or so on insurance anyway.

VISAs
These days in Western Europe, we basically don’t need a visa to travel at all. Of the countries you could fly into, out of or through whilst around France, as far as I am aware, you don’t need visas for Germany, Spain, Italy, Belgium, Switzerland, Luxembourg, Portugal or the Netherlands.

If you are flying via the USA, you need to complete an online visa application, which can be done here for free. Make sure you do this, or else you’ll turn up and get turned back or face some difficult questions!

Money/credit cards
Travellers cheques? Qu'est que c'est? Don't even bother. All you need is cash and a credit card.

I don't even buy foreign currency in the departing airport anymore. The FX agencies are basically robber barons playing the buy/sell spreads.

Instead, I recommend getting cash out at your destination airport. I am yet to arrive at an airport and not be able to get some local cash out, OR a taxi to my onward destination that wouldn't accept a credit card

TIP: If you are flying into Hong Kong airport, the taxis do not accept credit cards, so get some HKD$ out in the terminal.

In terms of credit card acceptance, this is also not an issue as Amex, Mastercard and Visa are cool basically everywhere in France. Of course, you'll want some cash on the ground.

Make sure you check the charges on your credit card for:

• Foreign Currency (FX) exchange charge – usually a % charge of the total, and the charge to convert from the local currency back to your banks home currency (e.g. EUR to AUD, or EUR to USD)
• Cash advance charges – can be up to $5!

For Australian readers, I carry the following 4 cards when travelling:

• Platinum Amex – primary spending due to the 1.5:1 Qantas points earn, note that it does have a pricey FX exchange charge. Credit charges only, no cash advances unless desperate.
• Local bank debit Mastercard – this is stored away for emergency only
• Platinum Mastercard linked to my Amex, which I can use for cash advances, in case of emergency, or in case Amex is not accepted.

The way I would work this is try and use a card from someone who charges you little to cash advance, and then use someone who charges a low fee to do FX transactions (this might be available from the same bank).

Australians should definitely check out Wizard's Mastercard which charges $0 for overseas cash advances (ATM withdrawals). Note though, I think they have a AUD$500 a MONTH limit on withdrawals (yes, a month).

I like to use platinum credit cards as if things really get nasty, they have concierge and emergency help.

Phone Roaming
“ARRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRGH!” – this is the sound of me screaming in frustration.

Two $2000+ bills in two trips, despite my efforts to mitigate this risk in 2010 with an international data roaming cap.

I've written fairly extensively on this topic; check out the related posts below.

• Overseas prepaid mobile internet information page
• Prepaid mobile internet in France
• SFR Vodafone prepaid mobile internet in France
• Prepaid 3G Internet with Orange Mobicarte
• How to set up Orange Mobicarte Internet Max
• How to avoid a data roaming bill
• How to save money on mobile roaming
• Australian data roaming cap plans
• Mobipassport prepaid internet SIM review

The language
In a nutshell? Learn some French.

I just can't stress this highly enough. It's not hard, and it's free. If you head over to Coffee Break French, you'll find 80 (yes, eighty) podcasts at 20 minutes each, where you can get a very good grip of French; well beyond what I would call “travellers French”.

Having some basic to intermediate French impresses the locals; you're more likely to get better service, a better attitude and in the end, it's just respectful and looks a lot better than bowling up to a local and saying in a loud voice “EXCUSEMEWHEREARETHETOILETSMONSIEUR”. He'll look at you like you're daft.

You can gain passable comprehension of the language in about 4 weeks with the podcasts I mention above.

Document protection
Before travelling, I always scan my travel documents including:

• Passport
• Ground itineraries
• Accomodation vouchers and info
• Ground and air transfers
• Travel insurance documents
• Plane e-tickets

I then upload them to some webspace I have, copy them onto a USB stick (which I take, and keep separate from travel docs), email them to a couple of close friends, and email to myself (I do have access anywhere on my iPhone though).

I also photocopy everything with 4 copies, and give one to my travel partner, put one in one travel bag, and 2 in another.

There is an App on the iPhone called GeniusScan – it's free and is awesome. You can scan documents directly from your iPhone and store them, email them and so on. This saves mucking around with printing and scanning and emailing documents.

In case you're wondering how to save attachments on the iPhone, I wrote a post on that topic, which you can read here.

You just never know, so it’s best to be safe than sorry.

And that's it! That's the end of the 7 Part Series! It's been fun writing it, and I hope you got something out of it. I'll revisit these posts and update as required. If you have any ideas on how the posts can be improved, feel free to email me.